Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
Our goal is to educate future leaders to tackle the multidisciplinary, wicked challenges in agriculture, food, and the environment. This requires that students gain competencies in agricultural economics (data analysis and hypothesis testing) and 'Extension skills.' In agricultural economics, we are natural multidisciplinary conveners because our work requires working regularly withexperts from the other disciplines. The strong extension presence in our department and college uniquely position us to train students in Extension skills: communication, leadership, finding knowledge experts, identifying and pooling resources, and building teams. We envision graduates of our program entering the Cooperative Extension System as Specialists and Associates; pursuing PhDs and eventually developing Extension programs and/or mission-oriented applied research/extension programs; and becoming leaders in the public and private sectors.Funds will be used to recruit the most promising students and to implement a long-envisioned Extension-focused M.S. program that features a year-long Extension Applications seminar followed by a year-long practicum that is concurrent with the thesis-writing process. The seminar will be team taught by Agricultural Economics Extension faculty and associates, as well as other Extension professionals from the throughout the university and state, with a strong showing from professionals outside of agricultural economics. The practicum will provide Fellows with opportunities to shadow faculty/specialists, build professional networks, and develop their own programs and materials that dovetail with their thesis research.
Animal Health Component
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Research Effort Categories
Basic
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Applied
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Developmental
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Goals / Objectives
We propose to redesign our Agricultural Economics Master's program in order to become the go-to program for students with a strong interest in serving agriculture and/or rural areas. Our students will train in 'Extension skills' (stakeholder engagement, multi-modal communication, interdisciplinary leadership, seeking out knowledge experts, identifying and sharing resources, and building teams) alongside core disciplinary skills (data analysis and hypothesis testing). Graduates of the program will enter the Cooperative Extension System as Specialists and Associates; pursue PhDs to develop Extension programs and/or mission-oriented applied research/extension programs; or become leaders in the public and private sectors. PIs willAttract and recruit promising students from throughout the Southeast, working with MANRRS and using our professional Extension networks among both 1962 and 1890 Land Grant Universities.Open up our own professional networks to Fellows so that they have at least one 'personal' mentor in addition to their teams of faculty advisors and professional mentors.Expose Fellows, in their first year of study, to the many types of problems that Extension professionals address through an Extension Applications seminar.Involve Fellows in practicums that cover both research and Extension no later than the end of their first year.Employ an 'apprenticeship model' to train Fellows in Extension skills alongside traditional AEC research skills.
Project Methods
Personal mentoring (Fellows matched with mentors at start of program, mentoring activities through entire duration) - PD Kusunose will be responsible for matching each Fellow with at least one 'personal' mentor. This mentor will be chosen based on having an affinity, be it educational, ethnic, gender, or cultural (common background) and/or currently working in a field or position in which the Fellow is interested (common goal). The mentor will be identified from outside of the department (e.g., in other departments, at other universities, departmental alumni, and from the professional networks of the PIs) so that Fellows feel more comfortable discussing a wider range of topics. Mentors and mentees will be expected to check in with each other at least once every quarter for the duration of the Fellow's M.S. program. We attach a draft of the letter we will use to invite potential mentors (Appendix 3).Extension Applications seminar (first year) - This once-weekly seminar course will span the entire first year, with the goal of exposing students, early on, to the many issues facing agriculture and rural areas. PD Kusunose will coordinate the 'team teaching' by PIs, other Extension faculty, Extension Program Coordinators, and faculty. Content will include current issues and policies, relevant institutions and agencies, and--importantly--examples of responsive programming and materials. We will reinforce the interdisciplinary nature of agricultural economics--and especially Extension--by inviting as many experts from outside the agricultural economics discipline as from within. We will rely on existing relationships across disciplines; we will also strategically invite faculty to forge new partnerships for both Fellows and faculty. When students are exposed early to potential thesis/practicum topics, they have more time to liaise with potential faculty mentors. Such early conversations lead to better thesis ideas, work of higher quality, and shorter degree-completion times.Internship and/or research (summer following first year) - Fellows will be placed in Extension-related internships and/or given substantive research assignments by their thesis committee members. Internship opportunities can be with organizations housed in or affiliated with our department (see Table 1), our many state- and regional Extension offices, the Southern Risk Management Education Center and the USDA's Economic Research Service. Internships will be vetted to ensure that students focus their efforts on one or two programs, topics, and/or datasets. Summer is the ideal time for students to get a substantial toehold on a project. Work on this project will translate into the student's thesis and Extension portfolio.Extension Apprenticeship/Practicum (second year) -Fellows will participate in and contribute to Extension programming and development; shadow faculty and participate in meetings (e.g., Economic Subject Matter meetings, Lender's Conferences, Income Tax Seminars, USDA's Outlook Meeting, and other regional, state, and county level Extension programs); propose and create their own Extension products that complement their theses. When students are tasked with acting professionally and generating real-world solutions and products, they know that they are held to higher standards; at the same time, they are still able to receive guidance in achieving these higher standards.